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Rethinking a snow blower

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JeffM
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2001-03-09          25256


Well, it's snowing again here in upstate NY. Even though the national news believes that this past week's "blizzard" was a complete bust, we got well over 3 feet at my place in the Adirondack Mountains. Now it is snowing heavily again and we are predicted for another 8-12" by tomorrow. I feel that the 3+ feet was way too much for the loader mounted plow I desire and would have taken forever with my loader. One of my farmer neighbors cleared me out with his huge tractor-mounted blower, although all the ice underneath caused him a lot of grief also. I will clean up on Sunday with my loader. Now I'm wondering if I should consider buying a blower instead of the Curtis plow next winter. How deep a snowfall can I reasonably expect to handle with the loader-mounted plow? One foot? 18 inches? I clear about 200' of driveway as well as a 30' by 50' parking area. Of course, with the loader or plow I have to clear almost twice that area to have sufficient space to pile snow all winter. I'm partial to a front-mounted blower, but I realize a rear blower with the loader up front is a pretty useful combination. Or should I just get the plow and call my neighbor for the 2 or 3 times a winter when we get more than 16" of snow? All opinions are welcome, except for Bird, because who would believe a Texan knows anything about snow? :>)



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Dave M
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2001-03-09          25262


I live in Western New York. I have had a 75" Meteor 3 point blower for 3 years. I would not want a bigger blower on my 40-ish HP tractor. Cost about $1500. Works very well, but is not as sturdy as a plow. I did break it once; it cost about $100 to get a new auger sprocket, chain and bearing. How many times per year do you clear more than 6" of snow? I find that by February I generally take off the blower and put a blade on the tractor because it isn't worth trying to blow 3" of snow. I did put it back on for the storm you mentioned, though. We got about 12", and I blew out my 500' driveway in 15 minutes, and I didn't have to worry about where I was going to put it. It can be very uncomfortable to blow snow into the wind on a tractor without a cab, though.

My Dad used a loader-mounted plow for many years on a Ford 8N. It was quicker than a back blade or blower when there was only a few inches of snow. It was better able to deal with a lot of snow than a back blade because you can pile the snow higher. It would probably be better for a large parking lot than a blower, too, but I don't think yours is big enough to be a problem.
....


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Murf
Join Date: Dec 1999
Posts: 7249 Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada
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2001-03-09          25271


Jeff, we plow a considerable amount of snow with loader-mounted plows on compacts (40hp class 4wd's) equipped with turf's. As they say in the movies "Be not afraid of it, for it cannot hurt you, not if the FORCE is with you.....". While I'm sure we get similar snow accumulations here (Toronto, Canada) as you do, since you are a south of here, but in the mountains. We regularly deal with snowfalls of +1' with no real problems (other than a lack of sleep). You do NOT need to leave a lot of extra room for 'stacking' the snow as you would when plowing with a truck. Since the plow is mounted out front on the loader, lifting the plow and pushing the top off the snowbank is VERY easy, as is pushing snow up & OVER a bank, something that is almost impossible with a truck since the plow sits so close to the front wheels. My suggestion to you would be to make, or have made, an 'adapter' to enable you to mount a used 6' truck-type snow plow on your loader. While the Curtis is a fine outfit, the cost differnce is HUGE, for example a used plow including fabricating my own quick-tach plate is about $500.00 complete.....your choice. Best of luck. ....


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Todd
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2001-03-09          25273


Hey Jeff,
Good advice above. I went with a thrower because even pushing snow over the banks wouldn't solve my problem. Trees in the way near the garage end of the driveway. Snow thrower just kind of tosses the snow thru them. I was wondering what kind of tractor and tires you had. Traction becomes an issue pushing snow, but not nearly as much of one with a snow thrower. My neighbor and I teamed up to clear our other neighbors 300'+ driveway. He couldn't get 10' into it going up the hill with a plow until I made a path with the snow thrower wider than his tires. I made it with turf tires and no chains going up a moderate slope on ice. Not easily, but 4wd and dif lock did it. You can always get heavy ice chains!
Todd ....


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Paul S
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2001-03-09          25279


Hey Jeff, We use a large rubber tired loader with a quick attach unit on the loader assembly to move our snow with. We take the loader bucket off and mount a power angle snow plow. You can't believe how easy and how high you can push the snow. You work the plow just like you would the loader bucket and keep piling it up. I don't like the snow blower unless you have dry snow. Takes to long to move the same amount of snow.



....


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JeffM
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2001-03-09          25280


Thanks for all the input, although I sure miss not hearing from Bird. I'm going to keep my eye open for a used truck plow this spring and summer and see if I can't save some $$$ over the Curtis plow. Otherwise that's what I will most likely do. I keep forgetting that you can stack the snow with a loader-mounted plow to some degree. BTW, Todd, I have a JD4400 with turf tires and I'm shocked at how much traction I have using the loader on snow and ice, especially with 4WD and with a 48 backhoe as rear ballast. I rarely have to use the diff lock. ....


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Bird Senter
Join Date: Jun 1999
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2001-03-09          25290


JeffM, Bird's been busy all day until just now. But you were right. I don't play in snow, and all I know about snow blowers and snow plows has been what I've read on the forums. I did actually see a few truck mounted plows working when I spent the one winter ('71-'72) in the Chicago area.LOL ....


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harvey
Join Date: Sep 2000
Posts: 1550 Moravia, NY
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2001-03-10          25317


JeffM I'm down just SW of Syracuse and we get more than our fair share. I ski lots at Whiteface, so I see the snow especially in the Old Forge area. I first started out here with a little 1500 Ford and a 4' box scraper. BOY did I feel good about that. Over a 1000 feet of drive and parking etc. Got tired of that after 6 years then the blizzard of 93-94. Bought a land pride 72' back blade 360 degree rotation. (That is still the weapon of choice.) I'd spend a lot of time pushing back snow banks. Found a little 4' 2 stage very light weight snow blower (it needed rebulding, it was all bent and broken). That was the ticket. I could windrow the snow 3-4 plowings drop the blade off, put on the blower and 1 pass each side of drive ALL GONE. Traded my little ford and 4' blower for a 4400 w/fel... Right now I am missing my snow blower. Granted I don't spend the time pushing back banks or, now, stacking snow but the blower is so much easier on the tractor than all of the loader work or banging the banks with the rear blade. Currently the 4400 has chains on all 4 mainly to protect the tires from cuts. Plus they do make the heavy pushing and skacking easier. Only using the rear blade and the fel. Gonna find another blower old and rusty and CHEAP, rebuild it for the few times I need/want it. Maybe a bright shinny new one if this construction season is as good as last one :-) ....


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Art White
Join Date: Jan 2000
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2001-03-10          25319


Jeff I don't know the depths of the snow we got but were down here trying to clean out for our open house on monday. Any way I'd tell you to forget the blades but for some clean up put a blower on the back and you won't get blowen in. Unfortunatly sold the tractor and blower that I was useing at my house and went to a skid loader. I can't see my neighbors now not that that is a problem but I have no wheres to go with more snow. Now the fun thing is going to be going home with a Gehl tele-handler to stack the banks from the past two months back another 20 feet and make them about 30 foot high instead of just 10 foot. I found it is far easier to use a blower because I don't get a 4' drift across the drive every time the wind blows a little, however I am a "little excited" about the fun I might have with the tele-handler cleaning up the mess I have now. ....


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TomG
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 5406 Upper Ottawa Valley
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2001-03-10          25323


Regarding how much snow will a blower deal with: I drive a 60" Meteor with 24 PTO HP. It's really a question of ground speed. Slow enough ground speed, and a blower will chew through almost anything. I guess that's an advantage over a blade where there's either enough traction or there's not. With an HST, you can just sort of creep and eat at a snow fall, but with my 12x4 gear tractor, I'd don't have that option. However, I can say that my lowest reverse is about .5 mph at PTO RPM. At that speed, the blower won't quite clear 2.5' - 3' of snow off the auger. The blower ends up acting like a plow, pushing snow ahead of it, with some snow coming off the ends of the blower. Traction may periodically break, and then I have to stop and let the blower chew awhile. In general, plowing is faster than blowing as long as pushing back banks isn't a problem. In addition, I think a case can be made that blowers can deal with very heavy-falls, although very slowly, but a blade may be unable to cope. ....


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JeffM
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2001-03-11          25357


Harvey, my place is due north of Whiteface about 15 miles - I can see it out my south windows. Spent 3 hours yesterday with the 4400 and loader cleaning up what my neighbor couldn't get at with his blower because of the ice underneath. What a ball! I pushed and stacked the snow back far enough to handle another big snowfall. Most of the banks I stacked about 8-9 feet high, simply because I could! My parking area and driveway now look like a "stadium" surrounded by these towering banks. My wife, bless her heart, accused me of going overboard and just playing when I should have been working. Mea culpa. My neighbor's blower is on a big 2-wd Allis-Chalmers with Ags and he said he was helpless because of the inclines and the ice. I was amazed that I never came close to getting stuck, even though there was some tire spinning on the ice and I was in the snow right to the top of the grill much of the time when pusing the banks back. (In fact, I stopped every so often to clean the accumulated snow from between the grill and grill guard.) So at this point I'm sure that a blower would have been faster, and a plow definitely faster for small accumulations, but I sure enjoyed what I was able to accomplish even with just the loader. And Art and Harvey, as you both know, we're in the bush leagues compared to you guys when it comes to snow accumulations. A 3 foot snowfall is a big event for us, but in your part of the state that is just your forecast every week or so! ....


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JeffM
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2001-03-12          25387


The following response was emailed directly to me by SteveC because he couldn't post a response (probably due to a firewall, we later determined). He told me that if I thought his response was relevent and of benefit to all to go ahead and post it. Thanks, Steve. Here it is:

Sorry, guys, but for whatever reason, this compact tractor board doesn't like my entries and won't let me log in to post a message (yes, I enabled cookies) so I've chosen to go direct. Specifically, I'm replying to Jeff Miner's question posted on 3/9.

I live in eastern Connecticut and we're getting hammered this winter too. I have a 400' paved driveway opening into a large parking area in front of the house and garages. I typically use a pickup truck with a 7' plow and move the big piles (after a few storms) with the front loader on my Kubota 4WD L2550 (glideshift transmission). I also have a couple snowblowers including a 10HP for touchup.

This year's weather has tested the credibility of everyone's snow removal methodology as you might guess. When we had the 2-foot-plus snowfall 3 weeks ago I couldn't even get out of the garage with the plow (it has to push up hill from there). I spent 3 hours behind the 10HP snow blower clearing the driveway and enough room to get the plow out. And, as you all know, you end up looking and feeling like frosty the snow man.

In my experience, for snowfalls less than 8-10" it is much easier to use a snow plow (provided you have some place you can push the snow). While you can use a snowblower on a 10-12 foot wide driveway, it is not easy to blow snow in a 100' wide-open parking area (you keep blowing the same snow). When you get over a foot, then snow placement becomes the real issue. While I can still use the plow in the large open areas and deal with the huge piles later with a front loader, the only way to do a driveway that has 2 1/2 foot snow banks already along the sides, is with a snowblower.

After that storm 3 weeks ago I decided to solve the problem. I ordered a Kubota BX2200 4WD diesel tractor with Curtis Cab (heated, with lights, fans, wipers, etc) and a 50" Kubota front-mounted snowblower. I added wheel weights and chose not to water-fill the tires. The Kubota PTO snowblower is well built and adequate for the task.

Well, after the latest 2-foot snowstorm and a couple 4-6 inchers for good measure, I'd say that it works great and the hydrostatic transmission is perfect for the application. So far I've only sheared one blower pin when I tried to eat the neighbor's mailbox (I had to replace it with a John Deere pin because the Kubota blower is so new my dealer didn't have one).

So what's the conclusion? Well, there is absolutely no justification for the expense. It isn't even worth addressing that. This combo fits squarely in the executive toy category and not for everyone. I'm only relating my experience to say that a tractor-mounted snowblower is great. Of course, staying out of the weather while you are using it makes it better ;-)

In truth, I don't think it will get much use if we go back to light winters. I already have another bigger tractor and plowing is much faster. I'll just think of it like my diesel generator that it is always there if I need it ;-)

.......Or should I just get the plow and call my neighbor for the 2 or 3 times a winter when we get more than 16" of snow? All opinions are welcome, except for Bird, because who would believe a Texan knows anything about snow? :>)

Personally, if you can only afford one, get the plow and call the neighbor ;-)

--Steve ....


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JeffM
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2001-03-26          25931


Update on the snow blower vs plow vs loader saga: Late last week my place in the northern Adirondacks got 25-30" of WET, HEAVY snow. I went up to clear it out on Saturday with the sun shining and the temp in the mid 30s. Took me about 3 hours with the loader, but I don't think I could have done much with a plow and a snowblower would have been put to a serious test also. As it was, I almost couldn't get the tractor out of the garage because I could only push the heavy mess about 6-8 feet before I would lose traction. I am so impressed with what is possible with this tractor-loader combination (JD4400-430 with HD bucket) after this trial. I left the scene with about 250 feet of 8-11 foot high snowbanks. These banks go back 20 feet in some places from the previous storms! I'll see if I can post some pictures later this week. ....


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TomG
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 5406 Upper Ottawa Valley
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2001-03-27          25948


That's my experience with loaders as well. Go about 10', the traction breaks, stop, stack the stuff off the side and continue on. But sometimes nothing but a loader will do the trick. That's the reason I stick with a 3ph blower--it keeps both ends of the tractor useful. What you describe would be manageable, but a test for my blower. At 24 HP, my 5' blower does manage 30" of ordinary snow and more but at very slow speeds. Even then, the fan doesn't clear snow off the auger fast enough. The blower turns into a loader bucket and starts pushing snow ahead of it. Every 20' or so, I have to stop and chew away at the pile. Sounds a little bit like the loader. The only difference is that I don't have to stack snow off to the side. If I had an HST, I could go slow enough so the snow would clear. The blower does manage 2' of the salt/sand/snow stuff the highway plows throw across the drive. The going is slow, and the blower doesn't throw it very far. 8-foot x 20' plus stacks are pretty impressive. I got a few like that, but the big snows are going south this year. We had a bunch of little snows. Snow blowing is still sort of fun for me, and I kind of wish for your snow. With your snow, I could entertain myself taking it off the drives, and it would give us a few more weeks of good snow shoeing in the bush. It's gotten to that unpleasant time of year when the snow supports you without shoes, but snowshoes are still needed for their ice cramp-ons. Still, it's more pleasant then in a month when everything turns to mud and I try to figure out how to avoid using the tractor until the ground settles. ....


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JeffM
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2001-03-27          25959


TomG, hopefully the link below will work. If not, I'll fix it later. Still 3-4 feet of snow in the open fields so plenty of snowshoeing, but I haven't been in the woods for 3 weeks now. Sorry for the poor picture quality - I'm not much of a photographer to start with and I'm still learning the camera. ....


Link:   Late March snow in the Adirondacks

 

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Paul Chase
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2001-03-27          25961


Well, I'm going to be looking for a 3pt blower for next year. Central NH, more snow than in any recent year (10+ I'd guess). The NH 7308 loader and Land Pride 72" rear blade work OK but not for the big storms. My neighbor with Kuboda B1700 and front mount blower bailed me out 3 times so far this winter. The banks on the sides have set and are 3' high. The blower just disperses everything into the woods. Gone, bye-bye, no more snow...

P.C. ....


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